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1--
Institutionalization
Variables
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1.01
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Year of Origin
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1.04
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Leadership
Competition
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1.02
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Name Changes
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1.05
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Legislative
Instability
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1.03
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Organizational
Discontinuity
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1.06
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Electoral
Instability
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1.01 year of origin
and 1.02 name changes- 1836, AC9
- 0, AC9
- The Blanco or Nacional
party was founded by Oribe, the second president of the
republic when Rivera, the country's first president
revolted against the Oribe administration because
president Oribe desired to change the form of government
from a unitary to a federal state. The first major Battle
between the two factions--September 19, 1836--is
generally considered the founding date for both the
Colorado and Blanco parties. Because both the forces of
Rivera and Oribe wore distinctive hatbands during their
confrontations, the groups were called the Colorado (Red)
and the Blanco (White) parties respectively. These names
have been retained until the present time. All sources
recorded the founding date of the party in general as the
1930's and in particular as September 19, 1836. The name
'Blanco' first used for the followers of Oribe in the
early years of the republic was retained as the official
name of the party until 1872 when it was officially
changed to the Partido Nacional, the name which it has
retained until now. However, members of the Partido
Nacional, other citizens of Uruguay and most scholars
continually interchange the two names though in the
scholarly literature the name 'Nacional' is often
indicated to be the official name of the party. The
Partido Nacional derives its name 'Blanco' from the color
(white) of the hatbands worn by the followers of Oribe in
their Battles against Rivera and the Colorados. In all
references to the Nacional party from its founding the
name 'Blanco' or 'Nacional' is given and nowhere is there
any mention of a name change after 1872.
- 1.03 organizational
discontinuity
- 14, AC8
- Within the period 1941
through 1949 there is no evidence of organizational
discontinuity. It is important to realize that the
Partido Independiente Nacional split with the Partido
Nacional in 1933 rather than in 1942. When the PIN first
participated in national elections. In 1954 one of the
major sub-lemas of the PIN joined the Partido Nacional
and formed the list 400 sub-lema, named reconstruction
Blanco (and led by Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez Larreta). In
1956 Benito Nardone and his federal league of rural
action, LFAR or Ruralistas, joined the Herreristas
sub-lema with Luis Alberto de Herrera and Eduardo Victor
Haedo. Also that year Daniel Fernandez Crespo, the leader
of list 51 of the Partido Nacional, formed the union
Blanco Democratica sub-lema of the Partido Nacional, when
the Partido Independiente Nacional joined with Crespo's
sub-lema and various other center and rightist groups. In
1950 a small group of Colorado conservatives joined with
the Blanco democratic union sub-lema of the Partido
Nacional. In 1962 a group of dissident Blancos led by
former cabinet minister Erro joined Frugoni and one
sub-lema of the Partido Socialista to form the Partido
union popular. The period 1941-1949 with no splits or
mergers earns a score of zero. During the period
1950-1956 with one major merger and two minor mergers, a
6 is recorded. During the period 1957-1962 with one minor
merger and one minor split an 0 is recorded. An
adequacy-confidence scale of 8 rather than 9 is given
because much of the data through 1960 came from one
source (Taylor, 1960) while the other sources contained
'bits and pieces' of information which verified the major
source on different aspects of organizational
discontinuity.
- 1.04 leadership
competition
- 14, AC8
- The variable leadership
competition is very difficult to measure on the party
unit level of analysis because within each party there is
usually more than one nationally recognized 'legitimate'
leader and each sub-lema of the party has nationally
known leaders. Although both Jose Batlle, the founder of
modern Uruguay, and Luis Alberto de Herrera, the
perennial Blanco candidate for president, had for many
years tremendous personal devotion from their followers,
neither party has been able to keep completely unified
for any one length of time under any one leader. Luis
Alberto de Herrera, from the mid 1920'5 when he was first
elected to the national council until about 1950, ruled
the Partido Nacional with an iron hand. All dissidents
were in essence forced out of the party and into the
Partido Independiente Nacional. However from 1950 until
1959 when he died Herrera had to share the leadership of
his party with such men as Eduardo Victor Haedo, Benito
Nardone (leader of the LFAR or Ruralista) and Martin
Echegoyen--as well as competing against the leaders of
newly developed sub-lemas, such as those begun by
Fernandez Crespo and Ferrer. In 1956 Crespo and Ferrer
formed the union Blanco Democratica sub-lema of the
party. This sub-lema received the largest number of votes
of any sub-lema in the country in the 1950 election.
After the death of Herrera, Nardone and Echegoyen,
equally, controlled the Herreristas' sub-lema while Haedo
joined with Crespo in the UBD. From 1959 through 1962
both sets of leaders controlled their respective
sub-lemas. Although Alberto de Herrera controlled the
Partido Nacional or at least its major sub-lema for over
40 years, the patterns of leadership development and
change in the later half of the 1950's and the first few
years of the 1960's clearly demonstrated the development
of institutionalized procedures for legitimate transfer
of political power among elites through both covert
process, e.g., intra-elite maneuvering, and through overt
processes, e.g., decisions at party conventions. An
adequacy-confidence scale of 8 rather than 9 is given
because the coder could not determine the precise
relationship between the influence of the party elites'
covert maneuverings and that of the decisions of the
delegates to the national conventions with regard to the
selection and support of party leaders.
- 1.05 legislative
instability
- Instability is .21,
AC8
- The Blancos were in the
minority throughout the first part of our time period,
but the party won control of the legislature in 1956 and
kept it throughout the rest of the second time
period.
- 1.06 electoral
instability
- Instability is .19,
AC8
- Legislative elections
were held regularly in 1950, 1954, 1950, and 1962. The
Blancos trailed the Colorados in the first two and won
pluralities in the last two.
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